New Delhi: Ruchira Kamboj, a 1987 batch officer of Indian Foreign Service (IFS) and currently serving as India’s ambassador to Bhutan has been appointed the next Permanent Representative of India to the United Nations at New York, the Ministry of External Affairs said on Tuesday. She will succeed T S Tirumurti and is expected to take up the assignment shortly, MEA said.

According to media reports, Kamboj was the All India women’s topper of the 1987 Civil Services batch and the topper of the 1987 Foreign Service batch. She began her diplomatic journey in Paris, France, where she was posted as the Third Secretary in the Indian Embassy to France from 1989-91 and learnt French there.

From 2011-2014, she was India’s Chief of Protocol, the first and only woman diplomat so far in the Indian government to have held this position. She has also served in Mauritius, Cape Town in South Africa as India’s Consul General, and at the Commonwealth Secretariat in London.

During her career, she has been Permanent Representative of India to UNESCO in Paris, Indian High Commissioner in South Africa, and Chief of Protocol in New Delhi. She was also posted as Counselor at India’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York from 2002-2005, where she dealt with a wide range of political issues, including UN Peacekeeping, UN Security Council Reform, and Middle East crisis, etc. /BI/